Whether making people happier now is a credible cause for longtermists. This may seem like a suspicious convergence, but longtermists often claim priorities such as AI alignment and preventing pandemics are important, even if we solely consider present wellbeing, so we shouldn’t dismiss the possibility. There is potentially a case to be made that if people were happier, perhaps they would be kinder and more cooperative, start fewer wars, and so on.
I have some thoughts:
1. Suspicious convergence
The cases of AI alignment and preventing pandemics seem less like suspicious convergence to me. These cause areas purport to reduce the risk of massive catastrophes occurring in our lifetimes. This is good for the future as avoiding loads of people dying will ensure we have a future, and it is important in the short-term because, well, loads of people dying is bad under a variety of moral views. The key point here is that both the longtermist and neartermist arguments follow from the same empirical claim—that we would be reducing the risk of massive catastrophes occurring in our lifetimes. So convergence arguably isn’t that suspicious.
In the case of increasing happiness, the longtermist and neartermist arguments for doing so will not follow from the same empirical claim. The neartermist argument is that increasing happiness is intrinsically good, whilst the longtermist argument will make multiple separate empirical claims about happier people being kinder, more cooperative and therefore that increasing happiness is likely to be one of the most effective ways to reduce the risk of massive catastrophes. The neartermist and longtermist arguments are entirely separate.
I’m not saying don’t investigate, but I am saying your prior that this would be suspicious convergence in the happiness case should be somewhat high.
2. Happiness as a longtermist approach to reduce x-risk
I would actually be interested in this analysis personally. If you do investigate if increasing happiness can make people kinder and more cooperative etc. and therefore reduce x-risk, I would note that this should be done in the context of higher-income societies as these societies are the ones that could feasibly cause x-risks.
Of course it is not enough to find that boosting happiness has a beneficial impact on kindness and cooperation as it could be that other approaches are even more cost-effective in doing so.
Hello Jack. A quick reply: I’m not sure how well the arguments for improving global being a sensible longterm priority will stack up. I suspect they won’t, on closer inspection, but it seems worth investigating at some point.
I have some thoughts:
1. Suspicious convergence
The cases of AI alignment and preventing pandemics seem less like suspicious convergence to me. These cause areas purport to reduce the risk of massive catastrophes occurring in our lifetimes. This is good for the future as avoiding loads of people dying will ensure we have a future, and it is important in the short-term because, well, loads of people dying is bad under a variety of moral views. The key point here is that both the longtermist and neartermist arguments follow from the same empirical claim—that we would be reducing the risk of massive catastrophes occurring in our lifetimes. So convergence arguably isn’t that suspicious.
In the case of increasing happiness, the longtermist and neartermist arguments for doing so will not follow from the same empirical claim. The neartermist argument is that increasing happiness is intrinsically good, whilst the longtermist argument will make multiple separate empirical claims about happier people being kinder, more cooperative and therefore that increasing happiness is likely to be one of the most effective ways to reduce the risk of massive catastrophes. The neartermist and longtermist arguments are entirely separate.
I’m not saying don’t investigate, but I am saying your prior that this would be suspicious convergence in the happiness case should be somewhat high.
2. Happiness as a longtermist approach to reduce x-risk
I would actually be interested in this analysis personally. If you do investigate if increasing happiness can make people kinder and more cooperative etc. and therefore reduce x-risk, I would note that this should be done in the context of higher-income societies as these societies are the ones that could feasibly cause x-risks.
Of course it is not enough to find that boosting happiness has a beneficial impact on kindness and cooperation as it could be that other approaches are even more cost-effective in doing so.
Hello Jack. A quick reply: I’m not sure how well the arguments for improving global being a sensible longterm priority will stack up. I suspect they won’t, on closer inspection, but it seems worth investigating at some point.